by Adam Hunt
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) held a three-day language symposium in Montreal from Sept. 1-3. The purpose of the meeting was to provide information on the new ICAO language requirements that are set to be implemented worldwide on March 5, 2008.
The symposium was predominately a chance for national aviation regulators, like Transport Canada and the FAA, to get some answers about what the new ICAO language rules mean and how to implement them in each country.
Many aviation associations were also present to make sure that this new set of rules will not have an adverse impact on their various sectors.
COPA staff member Adam Hunt represented Canadian personal aviation. International general aviation was represented by IAOPA’s ICAO representative and COPA Director Frank Hofmann.
The three days were spent in briefings from ICAO staff and contractors. Most of the presenters were linguists and aviation language experts who tried to impress on the audience the importance of the new ICAO standards and the need for professional language testing in order to comply with the new standards.
Much history was covered along with explanations of what the new standards mean.
Under the Chicago Convention national aviation regulators, including Transport Canada are required to implement the ICAO standards.
It was made very clear that by the deadline date, less than four years away, Transport Canada will have to ensure that all pilots, radio operators and air traffic controllers are evaluated for their ability to speak and understand the language used for aeronautical communication, which is English or French in Quebec and the National Capital Region and English in the rest of Canada.
Those people who are evaluated as being less than a defined “expert,” Level six in the language will have to be formally tested. Anyone whose formal evaluation shows that they are speaking and listening at a level five or four will have to be re-tested regularly.
Anyone who is tested below a level four will not be able to hold an aviation licence until they test at a level four or higher.
While the symposium featured many linguists, language testers and language training institutes, no one presented a program that could be implemented by any national regulator.
It was made clear that each country will have to develop their own means of evaluating, formally testing and perhaps training people in the language required with help from the quickly developing language testing industry that is springing up to take advantage of the work that they perceive is being created by this ICAO standard.
There is much to be done before the March 5, 2008 date.
At Transport Canada the person responsible for implementing this new ICAO standard is Manzur Huq, Director, General Aviation. COPA has been pushing for a special meeting of the Canadian Aviation Regulations Advisory Committee to discuss how best to deal with the impending requirements and especially the relatively short fuse on implementation.
Huq has committed that TC will form a working group with industry representatives, starting in October to examine the ICAO standard and make recommendations as to how this can be implemented in Canada.
TC procedures also require that a complete Q850 Risk Assessment Process be completed on issues such as this, prior to regulations being presented to CARAC.
Huq also stated that “costs to pilots will be kept to a minimum.”
COPA will be part of this working group to ensure that the voices of the majority of pilots in Canada are heard on this critical issue.
COPA understands that while there may be some past international airline accidents that were caused by language problems, there is no history of language problems causing accidents in non-airline flying in Canada.
Consequently, while COPA supports the intent of the ICAO standard, it is completely unacceptable that our members should be required to pay for language assessments or training in order to comply.